Chapter 4

Filming the Dream

Dreams are so much more beautiful than the stuff they call reality. -Pierre Boileau and Thomas Narcejac, The Living and the Dead

Production of the film that would become Vertigo--separate from the preparation of its blueprint, the screenplay-began when the first coverage of the novel was submitted to Hitchcock in late 1954. At this point, the assistant director Danny McCauley, put together a list of locations for the novel. Two years later, he prepared a list of locations for the Maxwell Anderson screenplay. Location visits began around the same time in 1956 and continued for another year before actual filming commenced.

The project evolved quickly. After Hitchcock returned from South Africa in August 1956 with the realization that Flamingo Feather would be impossible, he met to discuss the next project over lunch with the unit production manager, Doc Erickson, and the director of photography, Robert Burks.

A month later, From Among the Dead was the subject of a lunch discussion among Hitchcock, Jimmy Stewart, and Lew Wasserman. The trio then spent the next two days watching The Wrong Man (due for release in December), The Deep Blue Sea, and Henri Clouzot's Les Diaboliques, the Boileau-Narcejac project that had first attracted Hitchcock's eye.

Maxwell Anderson's San Francisco visit during the summer of 1956 was followed by a visit from Hitchcock, Coleman, McCauley, Coppel, and Burks in October. It was during this visit that many of the final locations were determined: Mission Dolores (present in the earliest of drafts), the Palace of the Legion of Honor, Fort Point, and Big Basin Redwoods State Park (near Santa Cruz). Other locations were still up in the air. Mission San Carlos Borromeo in Carmel was originally slated as the site of the climactic church tower, but Coleman remembered that he and Burks had found the location too obviously pretty. Hitchcock wanted a location that looked abandoned, and the search would have to continue, or perhaps abandoned and a set on a sound stage used. Coleman was staying with his daughter, a teacher in the Salinas area, when she recommended the rather secluded San Juan Bautista.

Only a few miles from Highway 101, San Juan Bautista is approximately ninety miles south of San Francisco. The town and mission are truly a hundred years away from the city, remaining frozen in the mid-1800s-full of western storefronts and stables, a large courtyard flanked by the long cloistered mission, an old stage hotel and livery. Look at the images of San Juan Bautista in the film and you see the San Juan Bautista of both 1850 and 1998. The only thing missing, ironically, is a tower. This fact seemed to dash the scouting party's hopes; the mission had once had a tower, but it was lost to fire in the earthquake of 1906 (the mission offers a breathtaking view of the San Andreas Fault).

In spite of this drawback, though, the mood of the mission settlement was perfect for-the film, and ultimately the decision was made to re-create the bell tower in a studio. This is an excellent example of why location scouting expeditions occur even before a script is finished: Not only do locations shape the finished screenplay but, more important to the studio, they shape the budget. The tower would be the most expensive set built for the production of Vertigo.

Hitchcock had found a trusted team when he joined Paramount. Coleman, art director Henry Bumstead, and Editor George Tomasini were loyal members of the team. Bumstead later worked on Topaz and Family Plot and Tomasini edited North by Northwest, Psycho, The Birds, and Mamie. His cameramen, led by director of photography Robert Burks, were also loyal members, whom he had kept from Warner Bros. Together; they would create in Vertigo a film of dazzling technical virtuosity.

Robert Burks's first job as Hitchcock's director of photography was on 1951's Strangers on a Train, and he would shoot every Hitchcock film through Mamie with the exception of Psycho. Theirs was a long, trusted relationship; the trademark Burks lighting and camera setup defined the Hitchcock look at a critical time in the director's career, so much so that the style was duplicated for the television series to give the shows that Hitchcock look. The few cinematographers Hitchcock worked with after Burks's tragic death (he and his wife died in 1968 in a fire started by a smoldering cigarette) were compelled to try and re-create the Burks look; the only one who succeeded was Leonard South, Burks's camera operator for all of the Hitchcock films, who photographed Hitchcock's final film, Family Plot.

After returning from the Vertigo location shoot, Hitchcock sat down with Robert Burks to discuss just how the vertigo effect would be achieved. Hitchcock's notes during the writing of the screenplay suggest that Coleman had some early ideas for producing the effect, but it was an uncredited cameraman who thought up the technique. Combining a forward zoom with a reverse track, the cameraman instinctively came up with what became known as the "vertigo shot"-one of the most innovative and imitated effects in film history.

"I'll tell you who came up with that idea," Coleman remembered. "Irwin Roberts, who was always used as a second-unit cameraman-I was always the second-unit director on almost everyone of the Hitchcock films [at Paramount] and we always used Roberts, but he didn't get screen credit on Vertigo because they gave the screen credit to another close friend of ours who did all the process work on the stage [Wallace Kelley]."

During this time, Vera Miles was having her hair, makeup, and costume tests shot for the dual role of Madeleine and Judy. Miles watched the test work with costumer Edith Head and makeup artist Wally Westmore on November twelfth in Paramount's Projection Room 5; while at the same time Everett Sloane (of Mercury Theatre fame) was being considered for the role of Gavin Elster. Miles reported to Stage 17 with Edith Head on November sixteenth for lens tests with Burks; from the end of November through the Christmas vacation, the production was on hold as Hitchcock found himself consumed with promotional activities for The Wrong Man-the film that may have helped to spell her downfall as the lead actress of Vertigo.

Hitchcock had given specific directions to Head for costuming, and he was confident that she would follow them to the letter. The two had first worked together ten years earlier, on Notorious (1946), and Head knew exactly what Hitchcock wanted: clothing that was stunning but simple, sexy but not too revealing. Her later work on Rear Window was perfect, though the task was daunting: What do you put on a girl who's a couture buyer? Grace Kelly never looked more beautiful-until To Catch a Thief, that is. Head was allowed to be more ostentatious in dressing this Kelly character, a rich young woman from the United States. The film had two costume-stopping moments: the bathing suit that gives the Carlton lobby pause and the orgy of costumes in the party at the end. Head was capable of giving the full range to Hitchcock. And she appreciated his matter-of-fact, no-nonsense approach to business. The director made certain specific requests, and she was allowed to fill in the details.

The requests for From Among the Dead were quite specific: The gentleman indeed seemed to know what he wanted. A gray suit was designed for Miles that would later cause legendary problems for Novak. It is perhaps the most often told Vertigo production story, one that Hitchcock, Head, and Novak repeated on many occasions. Edith Head wrote about the incident in her memoir:

... I remember her saying that she would wear any color except gray, and she must have thought that would give me full rein. Either she hadn't read the script or she had and wanted me to think she hadn't. I explained to her that Hitch paints a picture in his films, that color is as important to him as it is to any artist....
As soon as she left I was on the phone to Hitch, asking if that damn suit had to be gray and he explained to me that the simple gray suit and plain hairstyle were very important and represented the character's view of herself in the first half of the film. The character would go through a psychological change in the second half of the film and would then wear more colorful clothes to reflect the change.
. . . "Handle it, Edith," I remembered him saying. "I don't care what she wears as long as it's a gray suit."
When Kim came in for our next session, I was completely prepared. I had several swatches of gray fabric in various shades, textures, and weights. Before she had an opportunity to complain, I showed her the sketch and the fabrics and suggested that she choose the fabric she thought would be best on her. She immediately had a positive feeling and felt that we were designing together. Of course, I knew that any of the fabrics would work well for the suit silhouette I had designed, so I didn't care which one she chose.

Madeleine was given dark shoes to wear, which, in Novak's words, "anchored her to the earth." The actress took the limitations of her costume as a source of character development: "I can use that feeling when I play Judy. Judy is trapped into portraying Madeleine, and she doesn't want to. She wants to be loved as Judy. But she always has to go along with what someone else wants in order to get the love she wants. So I used that feeling of wearing someone else's shoes that didn't feel right, that made me feel out of place. The same thing with Madeleine's gray suit, which made me stand so straight and erect the way Edith Head built it. I hated that silly suit, to tell you the truth, but it helped me to be uncomfortable as Madeleine."

As the script was nearing completion in the summer of 1957, the front office began to express two concerns about the film: standard concerns in the legal department over Production Code problems, and a lingering dissatisfaction with the title.

The legal department raised a red flag in July 1957, informing Hitchcock that there could be legal problems with the character of the coroner at the inquest, and specifically with the condemning remarks he makes in his summation to the jurors. They felt that the speech "could not properly be made by the man presiding at the inquest. It is not judicial in tone or concept, and is more appropriate to an advocate or prosecutor than to a judicial officer. This is aggravated by the verbal description of him [later cut from the film] as a 'son of a bitch.'''

The concern was with libel; the real-life coroner in San Benito County was only one person, so any derogatory reference to him could be taken as a direct libel of that individual. Hitchcock apparently ignored the office's opinion, since the scene remains in the film, but some of its language seems to have been toned down.

Next, the office focused on the questionable morals of the film's characters. An August letter detailed problems with the early banter between Scottie and Midge about the brassiere and Midge's love of life. They recommended this should be eliminated, as well as any photography of "intimate garments hanging on the cord" in Scottie's kitchen after Madeleine's suicide attempt. They added, "If the present indication is to be approved that Scottie has completely undressed Madeleine and put her to bed, the evidence of embarrassment on her part will have to be played down. Also, on page 60, Scottie's broken line, 'Not at all, I enjoyed-talking to you' should be read without the break and also without any show of embarrassment." Geoffrey Shurlock, the man responsible for trying to keep Hitchcock "moral," went on to note five additional scenes that suggested illicit relations between Madeleine/Judy and Scottie.

Although most of the concerns focused on illicit sex, Shurlock also worried about a different kind of morality. His note would have an impact on the final draft: "It will, of course, be most important that the indication that Elster will be brought back for trial is sufficiently emphasized"-a note referring to the final script's original ending, in which Midge and Scottie together hear the radio report of Elster's imminent arrest.

A final letter from Shurlock, on September eighteenth, reflected Hitchcock's resistance to change. Of the ten original concerns, six remained in the screenplay. Shurlock must have given up on the brassiere and Midge's love life, as well as on the coroner's possible libel. These were no longer mentioned. Underwear and any implications of illicit sex were the final concerns. At one point, Sherlock’s advice even seemed to stray into Hitchcock's own territory: In referring to the deep kiss by the ocean, Shurlock wrote that "while the camera angles of course are indicated, the scene should conclude on the couple and not pan away to the pounding waves." This sort of advice to avoid the cliché couldn't have pleased the master director.

From Among the Dead was the literal translation of the French novel's title—it was published in April 1957 in the United States as The Living and the Dead--and while filming cruised happily along under the working title, a nearly yearlong debate raged over what the final film should be called. As early as October 1956, Paramount executive Arthur Kram suggested the title "A Matter of Fact" to replace From Among the Dead, which many found awkward.
Another executive, Sam Frey, provided Hitchcock a list of seventeen title possibilities in September 1957, just before filming was to start. Of the seventeen-which included "Tonight Is Ours" and "The Mad Carlotta"-Hitchcock (according to a wire sent by Coleman) preferred "Face in the Shadow." This was one of six variations with the word Face as part of the title; all were thrown out on September eighteenth because of the Warner Bros.' film A Face in the Crowd and a novel with the same title by Peter Ordway. Hitchcock had wired New York only a couple of days before about his dislike for the title: "It's like a B picture and very cheap."
Hitchcock finally settled on Vertigo as a replacement title. His office wired the New York office of the decision, but a quick response came on September thirtieth: "Nobody here likes Vertigo as replacement for From Among the Dead. They prefer title Face in the Shadow to title Possessed by a Stranger." A return wire indicated Hitchcock's satisfaction with Vertigo. This would not be the end of the title war with the head office--for the moment, the production continued to work under From Among the Dead--but as far as Hitchcock was concerned, the battle was over.

[THE LOCATION SHOOTS:

FEBRUARY 28-00TOBER 15, 1957]

Photography for Vertigo began with second-unit location shoots in late February of 1957, long before any of the actors would report for work---indeed, some six months before the script itself had been entirely finalized. Second---unit work (usually involving undemanding background photography that requires the presence of neither actors nor director) rarely begins before the principal photography, but Hitchcock's illness and delays caused by Kim Novak reversed the order; forced to push back his own intended start date of late spring, Hitchcock was obliged to let the filming begin without him.

On February twenty-eighth, the second-unit team, under the direction of assistant director Danny McCauley, began their work with a series of window view shots: The views from Scottie's apartment in the 900 block of Lombard Street; from the McKittrick Hotel; from Midge's apartment; and from the window of the Argosy Book Shop out onto Powell Street. They also did test shots at the Palace of the Legion of Honor.

McCauley, Burks, and South returned to San Francisco late in August to shoot some additional tests at Mission Dolores; they also shot all of the film's traveling-car footage, which would later be used in transparencies on Paramount's Stage 2---the domain of Farciot Edouart, the head of process photography at Paramount. Edouart had begun with Paramount before World War I, and he was considered the best in the business at the art of combining pre-shot footage with new scenes to transform their appearance; before commencing work on Vertigo, he had finished the extraordinary process work for Cecil B. DeMille's The Ten Commandments.

Just as they were leaving for San Francisco to begin principal photography in August 1957, the production was thwarted by another serious obstacle. Kim Novak, who had already delayed production with a summer European vacation, now refused to show up for work on August thirtieth. She was holding out for more money---not from Hitchcock, but from Columbia, her home studio. Columbia immediately put her on suspension. The stakes were high---if the gamble by Novak and her agents didn't work, she would lose Vertigo and Bell, Book and Candle with Stewart.

The trade papers in Hollywood loved the fight as much as Hitchcock must have hated it. Variety's headline was characteristically jocular: KIM NOVAK DEFIANT; WILL BE "AMONGST" THE MISSING TILL COL RAISES HER SALARY. In The Hollywood Reporter's "Trade Views" column, W. R. Wilkerson had this to say: "The Agency pulling of Kim Novak from the Paramount picture is, in our books, one of the most stinking agency maneuvers this business has had."

Harry Cohn's Columbia was paid $250,000 for Novak to do Vertigo and the next picture with Stewart-but Novak herself was still making $1,250 a week. Interviewed after the fracas was resolved, Novak explained that her actual take-home pay was even less-around $250. "I was unable to buy sufficient clothes for myself," she told Bob Thomas of the Associated Press. "When I wanted to go to a party, I'd have to borrow a dress that Rita Hayworth had worn in a picture .... The studio was making a great deal of money off me, and I was seeing very little of it."

As unnerving as her salary strike was for Hitchcock, Kim Novak's stunt worked. By September, Novak had renegotiated a two-step pay hike: Beginning with From Among the Dead, Novak would be bumped to $2,750 a week; at the start of 1958, the number would increase to more than $3,000. As Novak explained to Bob Thomas, "I don't like to have anyone take advantage of me."

As the finishing touches on the screenplay were being made in September, Kim Novak finally reported for work. She shot three days' worth of makeup and wardrobe tests on September thirteenth, sixteenth, and eighteenth (in the gray Madeleine suit, as well as Judy's more colorful wardrobe). Additional tests were shot just days before the crew left for San Francisco.

Hitchcock loved San Francisco. The family owned a ranch not far away, near the little town of Los Gatos in Scotts Valley. He had long dreamed of making a San Francisco movie. This dream may have roots in one of Hitchcock's favorite books, Wilde's The Picture of Dorian Gray (a book he read "many" times, according to Spoto). Wilde writes of San Francisco: "It's an odd thing, but everyone who disappears is said to be seen at San Francisco. It must be a delightful city, and possess all the attractions of the next world."

Despite his desire to make this film at this time, Hitchcock hated to be manipulated. The past year had been unbearable: His illness, the trouble with Miles, and finally the imbroglio over Novak-which he could only have seen as childish grandstanding---had all threatened to kill a project he wanted to make. He'd walked away from other problem productions; he could easily have scrapped this film and begun the project he'd been dreaming up with Ernest Lehman for MGM. Years later, he would advise François Truffaut repeatedly during their interviews never to be afraid of walking away from a project.
But this time, Hitchcock did not walk away.

Filming began September thirtieth in San Francisco. The first scene to be filmed was the haunting Mission Dolores sequence, in which Scottie trails Madeleine to the grave of Carlotta Valdes. It was a fitting passage with which to begin, as it had survived all of the screenplay drafts---it had been a part of the director's vision from the very start.
The scene lasts three minutes; it required more than twenty setups, eventually yielding twenty-eight linked pieces of film. An entire day and part of the next morning were spent at the location.

Detailed records of the filming exist, thanks to Peggy Robertson, who served as script supervisor---one of the most vital roles in a film production. Robertson had worked before with Hitchcock, during his brief return to England after the war. Her work on Vertigo was invaluable to the production, and remains so to the film historian: Her daily records chart the course of the film, describing each take in both story and technical terms (specifying, for example, what lenses, special filters, and camera movements were used for each shot). Along with these notes came a list of which takes were to be printed for the next day's rushes. Entrusted with this prodigious job, Robertson would become Hitchcock's trusted special assistant for the rest of his career.

The very first shots filmed with the actors were the exterior shots of Madeleine and Scottie entering the chapel of Mission Dolores. The first take of the first shot was filmed at 8:15 A.M.: Scene 58. Three takes were required; in fact, most of the shots filmed in the course of Vertigo's production would require only one to three takes. An exception that first day was the complicated set of point-of-view (POV) shots in which Scottie watches Madeleine at the Carlotta headstone; these required a simple camera move, which complicated matters enough to require six takes on the average.

Novak remembers stumbling during the film's first takes. "When I tripped over a tombstone in the cemetery scene, Jimmy helped me up and said softly, with a small smile, 'You might try lifting your feet.'"

Mission Dolores is the oldest building in San Francisco, dedicated on October 9, 1776, and completed on August 2, 1791. There are three bells in its tower, provided between 1792 and 1797, and it is their actual sound we hear at the end of Vertigo's mission sequence: One of the takes listed in the script supervisor's report is a sound recording of the tolling bells. The western writer Bret Harte wrote some verse upon hearing the Dolores's bells toll, lines that seem appropriate to the film as well:

Bells of the past, whose long-forgotten music still fills the wide expanse,
Tingeing the sober twilight of the present with color of romance.
The mission's cemetery contains a who's who of early Spanish California, from the first governor of northern California, Don Luis Antonio Arguello, to the far less noble James Yankee Sullivan---who either committed suicide in jail or was killed by an angry mob after caught stuffing ballots in a local election in 1856. A visit to the cemetery today reveals few changes from October 1957. Careful observers will notice that Hitchcock rearranged the entrance slightly. Visitors actually enter the mission, as did Stewart and Novak, from the left. There is only one exit, at the altar, to the right, which the film suggests leads straight into the cemetery. In reality, the cemetery is to the left of the altar, and visitors must enter the garden by walking to the end of the mission and entering through a small arch.

Today, the layout is still familiar, but changes have been made even in the last ten years. On the author's first pilgrimage to the site in 1986, the cemetery was virtually identical to what one sees in the film. Today, the low shrubs that framed the cemetery have all been removed, though the seemingly eternal English yews through which Stewart spies on Novak remain. The Our Lady grotto to the left of Carlotta's grave is now gone-replaced by a circular spot in the path to commemorate the thousands of Native Americans buried in the cemetery, once several city blocks in size.

Even the grassy spot where the Carlotta headstone was placed is gone ---replaced by a concrete walkway between one of the few sizable gaps in the headstones. After a period of restoration and improvements, the cemetery has lost something of the slightly abandoned charm visible in Vertigo. What cannot be changed however is the remarkable light of the cemetery, an effect produced by the large whitewashed walls of the mission. The quality of this reflected light is impressive; its bluish, slightly fogged quality was captured in the film without resort to any special technique.

The first full day wrapped at 6:30 P.M. Robertson logged the estimated first two minutes and forty-nine seconds of screen time completed-in a testament to Hitchcock's efficiency and planning, a time that is within seconds of the duration of the finished sequence. (The final film would run 127 minutes.) Hitchcock, the actors, and the crew returned to Mission Dolores the next morning to film additional close-ups of Stewart and Novak, never logging more than five takes on any shot. At 12:30, the crew broke for lunch and moved to the Brocklebank Apartments-conveniently located across the street from the Fairmont Hotel, where cast and crew were staying while in San Francisco. Nob Hill, where the Fairmont and Brocklebank buildings are located, is virtually unchanged today. Many tourists mistake the Mark Hopkins building as the home of Madeleine Elster---an easy mistake to make, since the building is practically a twin of the Brocklebank, located on the other side of the Fairmont at 2000 Mason. In fact, the Fairmont can be seen behind Scottie in the later shots at the Brocklebank after Madeleine's suicide. Lee Patrick played the older woman that Scottie mistakes for Madeleine in one of these later scenes; years before, the actress had a memorable role in another San Francisco classic as Effie in John Huston's The Maltese Falcon. The day ended after 6:00 P.M.; another two minutes and thirty-seven seconds had been added to the tally of finished script time.

The next two days were routine. October second was spent at the now-demolished McKittrick Hotel. The only scene to require more than the few Hitchcock standard takes was the dialogue between Scottie and the hotel manager-played by Ellen Corby (who became well known as the grandmother on The Waltons in the 1970s)which required five.

Part of Thursday, October third, was spent in the alley behind Podesta's (only in the film-in life, the alley was at Maiden Lane, not far away) and outside Scottie's apartment (900 Lombard Street, on the block beneath the most crooked street in the United States). Thursday also marked the first night shoot for the film-the scene where Midge drives up to Scottie's apartment and sees Madeleine leaving. The first take of the day was at 9:00 A.M. in the alley; the last at 10:45 P.M. outside the apartment-which means that most of the crew were involved from 7:00 A.M. until nearly midnight.

And the next day was not very restful. Three different locations: the exterior of Gump's, Fort Point, and Judy's hotel. The Gump's sequence was simple-the first take rolled at 10:00 A.M., and they were on their way to Fort Point by 11:30.

Herbert Coleman remembers that the scenes outside Gump's and Ransohoffs were shot with a hidden camera, so as not to attract onlookers. Yet in the film, both scenes appear to be shot from the sidewalk-not from inside a van, as Coleman recalls-and there is no indication in Peggy Robertson's notes that any special measures were taken.

Fort Point, the scene of Madeleine's suicide attempt, is one of the stunning locations most often associated with Vertigo. Located beneath the Golden Gate Bridge, it is one of the most dramatic locations in San Francisco from which to view the bridge, the bay, and the city.
On October fourth, Stewart and Novak were filmed arriving at the location. Madeleine would then drop petals from her Podesta flower arrangement in the bay and then suddenly jump in. For the brief jumping shot, Novak was replaced by a double, who actually jumped onto a stretched parachute. This is the scene for which some have claimed that Novak was tormented by Hitchcock's demands for endless takes; Novak would eventually spend time in a tank on a Paramount sound stage, but on this day the double endured only four takes-with the third and fourth printed for use in the finished film.

Fort Point was not without its complications. Unlike in the sound stage set used for the rescue scene, there are no steps to help in climbing out of the water; the double had to jump four times off the sheer edge and onto the parachute. Regardless of the weather, the waves are always high and the drop is dramatic. Jumping from the side onto anything would not have been easy.

At 5:25, the crew packed up for a night shot of Judy entering the Empire Hotel. The Empire, located in the 900 block of Sutter, was chosen for its seediness and for its memorable green neon sign. Hitchcock wanted the green neon light to spill through Judy's window for two key scenes. The interiors would be duplicated back at Paramount, but the hotel would be used for several exterior shots of Judy arriving, and one shot of Judy opening her shades.
You can still visit what was once the Empire Hotel. Gone are its seedy, rundown quality-and, unfortunately, the large neon sign. In fact, the only indication that the building at 980 Sutter was once the Empire Hotel is the name Empire stamped in concrete above the hotel's bar, the Plush Room. Now called the York Hotel, the recently renovated building is decidedly more upscale than in the 1950s: Judy would have to shell out five to six hundred dollars a week for her room today.

Inside, though, a surprise: Though there have been substantial changes throughout the building-many of them designed to bring the building back to its pre-1950s splendor-a visitor to what is now room 501 will immediately recognize the room Hitchcock and art director Henry Bumstead re-created at Paramount. Still present is the armchair sitting in front of the bay window; the bathroom is still by the entrance, and the closet is now a built-in bureau. Though it never appeared on film, the room is hauntingly familiar-permanent evidence of Hitchcock's amazing concern for authenticity. After all, few directors would have felt compelled to stick to the reality of the hotel room; only a handful of people in the world would know that he had made changes to the interior. But that handful mattered to Hitchcock. He told Truffaut that realism, even in the smallest details, was important to him-a sentiment borne out in a visit to the York Hotel.

It took about an hour to set up at the Empire; then, after only a few takes, another long day was wrapped at 7:45-bringing the total screen time filmed to just over twelve minutes in five days' work. Five days would be the end of a studio week (six-day weeks had ended earlier in the decade), but Hitchcock had begun Vertigo on location, which allowed weekend work to save money. And so they pressed on.

Saturday's lineup included three locations: the San Mateo cemetery for a simple shot of Scottie looking at Madeleine's grave; some additional exterior work at the Brocklebank Apartments; and an early-evening shot of Judy at the Empire Hotel. The evening shoot finished a little after six.

The early finish compensated for the 4:00 A.M. call at Union Square on Sunday. The scene in which Scottie walks the empty San Francisco streets is one of the more memorable moments in the film. The empty predawn Union Square is shot from a high angle, as Scottie crosses Stockton and walks east on Geary. The first take rolled at 5:00 A.M., and only three were required. They were ready to move to the flower shop, Podesta Baldocchi--only a few blocks away on Grant-by 5:30.

As in the case of the room at the Empire Hotel, the interior settings in a film are often reproduced in a studio, giving the filmmaker complete control over the environment. But art director Henry Bumstead honed in on a striking visual detail in the actual Podesta that he knew would add vivid verisimilitude to the scene-the shop's striking Italian tile floor-and recommended shooting the interior scene on location. (The back entrance into the flower shop was recreated later on a sound stage.)

Florists at Podesta recall having to change flowers several times because the hot studio lights were wilting them. What is amazing is how the crew managed to fit into such a small location. Vertigo was filmed in the 1950s Vista Vision color process, and the camera and tripod for such a production are enormous, requiring a minimum of two or three people to operate them. At least three, and possibly four or five, lights would have been needed. On this Sunday, Burks and South were manning the camera; standing about would have been another half dozen or more crew members to help set up and break down the equipment; Hitchcock himself and script supervisor Peggy Robertson would have to have sat close enough to the camera to see the action-all of this in a tiny florist shop!

Podesta Baldocchi had occupied that space for nearly forty years-the previous tenant had been Tiffany's-but in the years since the production of Vertigo, they have moved from the small shop at 224 Grant to new quarters on Fourth and Bryant. The site used for the filming has become a fashionable clothing shop, its striking tile flooring covered with wood. October seventh and eighth were spent do exterior work at a number of locations Golden Gate Park, the McKittrick Hotel, Fort Point, and the Empire Hotel. The running total of completed film time was now at seventeen minutes, forty-seven seconds. The most extensive location work on these two days was done on the eighth, at the Palace of the Legion of Honor in Lincoln Park.

The scenes where Scottie observes Madeleine entranced by the portrait of Carlotta Valdes were filmed in the Palace's Gallery 6. William Eisner, a former registrar at the museum, recalls that the museum was turned "topsy-turvy" as Hitchcock waited for just the right light. "We didn't close the museum, but we were afraid people would trip on the cables. People watched the moviemaking more than the paintings," Eisner said. Bert Scully, the senior guard and later chief guard, was paid five hundred dollars for his small role: handing Jimmy Stewart the museum's catalog and identifying the painting.

The Palace of the Legion of Honor boasts an impressive site, on a hill overlooking the city and San Francisco Bay, but it was not always considered a first-rate museum by San Franciscans; recent renovations have increased its gallery space significantly, though, giving the museum ample room to display an enormous collection, whose treasures include several Picassos. The Palace staff is often asked by tourists where the portrait of Carlotta Valdes is on display, but alas, the director's concern for authenticity did not extend this far:
Portrait of Carlotta was painted by John Ferren especially for the film, and it may no longer exist (although an earlier version with Vera Miles's features hangs in Robert A. Harris and James C. Katz's office). But the other paintings seen in the hall, hanging behind Scottie, still hang in the Palace in Gallery 7: Nicolas de Largilliere's Portrait of a Gentleman (1710) and Charles-Andre van Loo's Allegories of the Arts: Architecture (1752-1753).

On October ninth the crew returned to the gallery to continue, filming mostly interior work; they finished relatively early, at 3:05, anticipating the big move the next day to San Juan Bautista.

Perhaps there is no other location that is more closely linked to Vertigo than this sleepy town off Highway 101. Certainly the town is proud of its association with Hitchcock's masterpiece: The film is prominently mentioned in the chamber of commerce's literature, and the state park distributes a sheet offering a few general facts on the filming-the general date of the work and the fact that the tower did not exist at the mission, for example.
The Vertigo screenplay called for an extensive visual tour of San Juan Bautista to emphasize the empty, abandoned atmosphere, but Hitchcock must have realized he could do it all in a few quick gestures: All the establishing footage that remains in the final version is a slow pan down on the livery as Scottie approaches Madeleine seated in the surrey. The livery is unchanged today, but the surrey and horse have been moved from the room on the right to the room on the left; the old horse, which gives Stewart one of his fleeting moments of comic relief in this haunting segment of the film, is tucked in the back, looking forgotten.

The Vertigo team spent two and a half days in San Juan Bautista. Many of the older members of the town remember Hitchcock's visit: In a recent interview, the current owner of the nearby Casa Rosa restaurant recounted the many visits Kim Novak has made to the restaurant over the years (and the many tourists from around the world who have eaten there after Spoto mentioned her fondness for it in his Hitchcock biography). Waitress Cheryl Hagan remembered her parents telling her that she was held by Novak during the filming in the square. Only four or five at the time, Hagan doesn't remember Novak herself, but she does remember her parents' pride at being there when it all happened. Another local resident, Carmen Munoz, now a chamber of commerce representative, was only recently married when she visited the set one evening after dinner at her parents' house. "Of course, I wanted to see the stars-Jimmy Stewart or Kim Novak. I did see Hitchcock, but that didn't seem such a big deal at the time," Munoz remembered.

Leonard Caetano, owner of Mission Reality, had the most vivid recollections-among them a small revelation about the alterations Hitchcock's crew made to their historic site. Two of the arches on the cloisters, he recalls, had to be faked with plywood and paint. Caetano remembered the crew building the fake arches to cover square openings that had earlier been cut into the cloisters so that carriages could enter. The faked arches-the larger ones at the far ends of the cloister-restored what the crew must have seen as authenticity to the facade. Caetano also remembers a large crane being brought in to film the body on the rooftop from the perspective of the tower. Caetano recalls the crew dropping a body dummy from a basket hanging from the crane, and camera operator Lenny South and production manager Doc Erickson recall filming a falling dummy from the crane. In the film, we do see Madeleine's fall, from two different angles: We watch from Scottie's point of view as she falls past a window at his eye level; later, during Judy's letter-writing flashback, we watch from above as she falls. (It is this latter viewpoint that is also used earlier in the film, during Scottie's nightmare sequence, when it is his body that falls, rather than hers.) But South and Erickson confirm what careful viewers will suspect. The body-dropping footage shot at the mission was never used in the film; it was fabricated later using process photography.

The first day in San Juan Bautista did not start until nearly noon, and the crew was forced to stop abruptly thereafter to wait out the sudden rain. The only material filmed that afternoon were two interior shots (without actors) of the Plaza Hotel Bar room and front parlor, and of Scottie entering the mission in pursuit of Madeleine; the shots were intended to convey the silent, deserted quality of San Juan Bautista, but they, too, failed to make it into the final cut.
Scene 207 reads:

INT. CHURCH. SAN JUAN BAUTISTA-DAY
Scottie runs in and looks around frantically. The church is empty. A moment, then he hears the sound of footsteps running up wooden steps. He turns in the direction of the sound, sees a door standing open at the side of the church, and through the door the beginning of a flight of steps. He runs to the open door and goes through.

Of that screen moment, only the shot of Scottie running into the mission and looking around frantically was filmed at San Juan Bautista; the doorway and stairs he sees were built back at Paramount and then edited in later. They finished filming these few scenes a little after 5 P.M.  The next day, October eleventh, was devoted to the events that take place in the courtyard between the mission and the livery-among them Scene 195, the difficult opening panorama of San Juan Bautista, which begins with the camera looking down the cloisters and then slowly pans to the right. Five takes were made on this pan, and the fifth one was printed; in the original directions, this is the lead-in to the Plaza Hotel interiors filmed the previous day, but in the finished film, the Plaza footage is eliminated, and the pan from the cloisters to the hotel dissolves into a pan down to the livery. The next scene filmed was 199; since the two intervening scenes were omitted in the final cut, the crew essentially was shooting in sequence. This is the scene as it appeared in the script:

199. INT. LIVERY STABLE-DAY
(Madeleine's eyes are closed. Scottie, leaning against the surrey, looks up at her intently. After a moment he calls to her softly.)
SCOTTIE
Madeleine...?
(She opens her eyes and looks down at him.)
SCOTTIE
Where are you now?
(She smiles at him gently.)
MADELEINE (softly)
Here with you.
SCOTTIE
And it's all real.
MADELEINE
Yes.
SCOTTIE (firmly)
Not merely as it was a hundred years ago. As it was a year ago, or six months ago, whenever you were here to see it.
(Pressing)
Madeleine, think of when you were here!
(She looks down at him with a worried, regretful smile, wishing she could help him. Then she looks away into the distance, and speaks almost irrelevantly.)
MADELEINE (dreamily)
There were not so many carriages, then. And there were horses in the stalls; a bay, two black and grey. It was our favorite place. But we were forbidden to play here, and Sister Teresa would scold us....
(Scottie looks up at her in desperation. Then looks about the stable for help. His look scans the carriages and wagons lined against the wall, goes past the old fire truck on which there is a placard proclaiming the world's championship of 1884, and finally stops at a small buggy-a bike wagon-to which is hitched a full-size model of a handsome grey horse.)
SCOTTIE
Well, now, here!

(He races to the horse. On it hangs a sign: "Greyhound World's Greatest Trotter.')

SCOTTIE
Here's your gray horse! Course he'd have a tough time getting in and out of a stall without being pushed, but still ... You see? There's an answer for everything!

(He looks across to Madeleine eagerly. She is staring ahead, lost in the past.)

SCOTTIE
Madeleine! Try!

(No answer. The music is more insistent, now, a pulling wind, and the faint voices call more clearly. Madeleine slowly rises to her feet as though sensing the call. Scottie moves back to her and stands there, looking up. He raises his arms, she puts her hands on his shoulders and slips to the ground with his help, and he is holding her. Their heads are close together.)

SCOTTIE

Madeleine, try ... for me....

(With a small movement, their lips come together, and they kiss; not impulsively, as before, but with deep, sure love and hunger for each other. Their lips part, but he still holds her tightly, his head pressed down against hers, and she is looking past him, her eyes wide with anxiety. And a Clock strikes the three-quarter hour.)  
 
SCOTTIE

My love ... because I love you...
MADELEINE (whispering)
I love you, too ... too late ... too late.
SCOTTIE
No ... we're together....
MADELEINE
Too late ... there's something I must do....

(He holds her gently now; brushes his lips along her hair, to her eyes, down to her mouth.)

SCOTTIE (murmuring)
Nothing you must do ... no one possesses you ... you're safe with me ... my love...

(And they kiss again. As they part.)

MADELEINE
Too late...
(She looks up at him with deep regret and wonder in her eyes, then suddenly breaks from him and runs out the door. He stands still, startled for a moment, then runs after her.)

This scene, one of the most poetic and romantic in Hitchcock's canon, also offers a revealing window into the process by which a Hitchcock screenplay was turned into a film. The screenplay was written in great detail, as it should be directed-down to the camera directions and even the commentary on the music. The very specific visual detail Taylor wrote into the scene (none of which appears in the Coppel script) was ultimately revealed in a simple medium shot of the horse and carriage, rather than the long meandering pan he called for, but the careful attention to visual elements is characteristic of the best of Hitchcock's filmmaking.

The kiss, as passionate and filled with longing as the Cypress Point kiss-part of which was filmed the next day-required the most takes of the day: six, with the last one printed.
The next morning, the crew returned to the livery stable to film the background for what Hitchcock called "the swimming shot"-the film's kiss (Scene 249), in which the room seems to spin and transform around Scottie and Judy as they kiss in her hotel room. This shot-to be used later as process photography-required six takes. The crew wrapped in San Juan Bautista early, to get to their next site, Cypress Point, on the famed 17-Mile Drive, by 12:15.
Hitchcock and his crew spent three hours filming at the austere coastal location, spending the bulk of their time capturing the drive up to the point and the footage of Scottie and Madeleine as they walk to the edge of the bluff. The run down the bluff was completed using doubles for Novak and Stewart; the love scene was finished on the transparency stage back at Paramount Studios. To make it easier to match the scene later in the studio, art director Bumstead decided to eschew the many twisted cypress trees that can still be seen today along the 17-Mile Drive, in favor of a single tree he transplanted to the location for the purpose.

The day was finished by 3:57, wrapping earlier than usual to allow time for the equipment to be transported to Big Basin Redwoods State Park. In two and a half days, Hitchcock had accomplished all of the location work at San Juan Bautista and the vicinity-committing the film's tragic dreamscape to film by creating a mix of realism and artifice. It was a measure of the production's values that for background footage of the long drives to the mission, the second unit filmed a picturesque passage of road braced by tall eucalyptus trees just south of San Juan Bautista on Highway 101; in the final film Scottie and Madeleine drive to the town as if coming from Los Angeles, not San Francisco!

When cast and crew made the move from San Francisco to San Juan Bautista, the refined elegance of their Fairmont accommodations was abandoned for decidedly more humble surroundings. Hitchcock, James Stewart, Herbert Coleman, Doc Erickson, Robert Burks, and Peggy Robertson were all put up at Hitchcock's home in Los Gatos, according to Erickson; Novak stayed in nearby Watsonville with the crew.

Next on the agenda was the filming of the picture's dreamlike redwood---forest sequences. Vertigo aficionados have often assumed these were filmed at Muir Woods, close to San Francisco, especially since there is a reference to that location early on in the film's development; the scenes have even become known collectively as "the Muir Woods sequence." Muir Woods also features a dated redwood cross section as one of its exhibits, like the one used in the film. But the Vertigo sequence was filmed far away, in Big Basin Redwoods State Park.
The drive from Los Gatos or Watsonville to Big Basin is a long one: As the crow flies, Big Basin is thirty or forty miles away, but the twisting roads turn this into a two-hour drive. Why did Hitchcock choose Big Basin over Muir Woods, which is much more convenient to San Francisco?

Leonard South recalled that when Hitchcock first visited Big Basin "he loved it. He thought it was great. We didn't care for it, though. We felt the light wasn't as good as the Muir Woods---we had to bring in brutes [large studio lights] to make it work." Herbert Coleman, on the other hand, remembers choosing Big Basin for the opposite reason: that the light was too poor in Muir Woods.

The Spaniards "discovered" the Big Basin redwood forest not long before building missions Dolores and San Juan Bautista. Located about twenty three miles northwest of Santa Cruz, the basin isn't a true basin, but a slight depression in the Santa Cruz Mountains. The 2,500-acre area became California's first state park in 1902, after a photographer's interest in the trees began to call attention to the awesome landscape. The park now comprises more than sixteen thousand acres.

Sequoia sempervivens is the classic redwood that gives this forest its beauty, and its ancient splendor attracted Hitchcock. The stand of trees through which Novak and Stewart wander is more than a thousand years old. The Latin name and definition is prominent in all the literature connected with Big Basin; the film's explicit reference suggests the same was true even in 1957.

No one at the park has any recollection of the Vertigo filming; nor does any park record remain of the two-day visit. The crew's shooting days were shorter than usual-under five hours.

On October fourteenth, most of the time was spent on the conversation just prior to the redwood cross-section scene. Judging from where the Jaguar is parked and where the redwood cut is positioned, the scenes were filmed on a trail known today as the Redwood Trail. The two-and-a-half-page sequence was completed in a number of setups, the most difficult one requiring seven takes; in the final cut of the film, only a page of this material remains. Though Big Basin had (and still has today) a cross section like the one in the film, all of the dialogue surrounding the cross section itself was shot later on a soundstage, then integrated seamlessly with the location footage.

The cast and crew returned to Big Basin early the next day to film Novak and Stewart walking through the trees---the shots seen just before Madeleine seems to disappear behind a large redwood. The conversation itself, like almost all the other significant dialogue scenes at this location, was filmed back at Paramount.

The location shoot ended at 2:48. The entourage packed it in for Los Angeles and Paramount Studios after filming sixteen days without a break. But there would be no rest for the weary: At eight o'clock the next morning, shooting commenced on Stage 5, to film the scene set in Gavin Elster's office. Hitchcock, Stewart, and the crew faced three more days of shooting before their first weekend off.
 
 
[ON THE SOUNDSTAGE:
OCTOBER 16-DECEMBER 19, 1957]

According to Donald Spoto, Hitchcock so liked Henry Bumstead's design for Gavin Elster's office that he had the director redesign his home office in the same style. This is not strictly accurate, according to Bumstead: What Hitchcock was impressed with was his choice of paneling for the office, not the office itself, and the director asked Bumstead to purchase similar paneling for his Bel Air home, believing it would go well with some rugs he had purchased in Marrakesh during the filming of The Man Who Knew Too Much.

Elster's office-one of the film's many elaborately decorated interior sets-was filled conscientiously by Henry Bumstead with San Francisco memorabilia: old maps and posters, a prominent glass case holding a model of a ship. An entirely separate section of the room, complete with raised floor and a visible ceiling, gave the shorter Tom Helmore a chance to tower over the sitting Stewart. Coleman called Elster's office the "seven-walled set."

The set featured a large bay window that overlooked the shipbuilding cranes. All of the shots that contain the view out Elster's window were shot using transparencies: The window, in other words, was a film screen upon which the scene shot with the cranes were projected. In the finished film, the background plate appears in only a few shots. Most of the sequence is filmed so that the window does not show, leaving the Foley track-the soundtrack of ambient sound; in this case, introducing subtle hints of shipyard noise-to remind watchers what's outside the window.

The crew began to set up on that first day a little before 9:00 A.M.; the first take rolled at 10:20, and, with an hour break for lunch, the day did not finish until 6:10 P.M.
The soundstage work reveals a slightly different Hitchcock. Now, with everything at his control, he was able to push more surely for what he wanted. Setups took longer, and on average Hitchcock called for a greater number of takes. On the first day, there were seven takes on some dialogue from Elster as he sat at his desk. Line problems, camera-movement problems, and a director willing to push a little further for perfection made for longer days. Compared with many of his colleagues, Hitchcock was almost frugal with his footage.
Outside the studio, Hitchcock rarely took more than two or three takes, and even inside, he averaged seven to eleven takes. Herbert Coleman worked with far less efficient filmmakers.

"I assisted Willy Wyler on a couple of pictures," Coleman remembered, "and the contrast between Hitch and Willy Wyler was: Willy Wyler would do forty, fifty, sixty, ninety takes. Yet he knew exactly what he liked. I think on Roman Holiday, if he did fifty, sixty takes, he would say to the script clerk to print so-and so, hold so-and-so."

One difference between Hitchcock and many of his fellow directors had to do with what came later, in the editing room. Since Hitchcock was involved from the start in the conception and writing of his films, the editing was essentially in place before filming began: His scripts were designed to be shot one way, and one way only. Other directors are often required to provide "coverage"-footage of the same scene from several angles-so that a sequence can be altered if necessary in the editing room. Except when he worked for David O. Selznick, Hitchcock always had the final say in the assembly of his footage. He had the power and freedom to shoot with the possible economy that total control provided.

The sequence in Elster's office where Scottie's old school acquaintance offers the bait and Scottie reluctantly takes it-dominated early scripts, and it remains an important scene in the film. This scene, and the one with Midge that precedes it, are the only "normal" moments in the film-the only sequences not overly influenced by the haunting of Carlotta Madeleine or the sense of vertigo (even here certain elements do foreshadow these: the tall cranes, the swiveling chair, and the yearning for a freer time). Hitchcock took great care in establishing the mood of the film. He created real danger not in the dark, wet streetscapes of film noir, but in bright, carefully appointed offices.

Cast and crew moved to another part of the enormous Stage 5 for Elster's club after more than two days in his office. The day moved along without much incident; Tom Helmore's inability to pronounce the name McKittrick Hotel properly in the club scene cost some time, as a similar problem pronouncing Ernie's had in his office the day before.

Then, after nineteen days of shooting, Hitchcock, Stewart, and the crew finally got some time off. Kim Novak and Stewart would return Monday morning for a sequence that would bedevil the production: their long first meeting in Scottie's apartment.

Scene 151 of Vertigo, the couple's first encounter-in Scottie's apartment, after Madeleine leaps into the bay-is nine minutes long. It lasts from page 46 to 57 in the final script, and it was filmed as written, with only a few minor line changes. But to nearly everyone involved, from the technical crew to the young actress at its center, it would prove one of the most daunting.

The scene begins with a slow pan from Scottie, seated on the sofa by the fireplace, toward his bedroom across the apartment; in passing, we see Madeleine's clothes drying in the kitchen. The camera stops on his bedroom; through the open door, we see Madeleine sleeping, and we hear her murmuring something about "her child."

It is a terrific shot, connecting Scottie's gaze to Madeleine. It also offers a good introduction to Henry Bumstead's design work. Hitchcock never came to "approve" a set, Bumstead recalls. "There was an assumption that because you were working with Hitchcock, you would do your absolute best." According to Robertson, Hitchcock liked to meet in the evening with the technical crew on the next day's set to discuss the work for the following day. There were seldom specific requests from Hitchcock above or beyond what the script required.

In his eighties, Bumstead is still one of the top art directors in the industry (his work for Clint Eastwood is his most notable), and his philosophy has always been that location should realistically match character. He dislikes design work that gives a spectacular apartment or home to someone who could never afford to live in such a place.

"In the early days, we kept good set pieces to reuse, and I was building an apartment for this one character, so I was using three great-looking bookcases that we had in storage. When the director walked through, he didn't say anything critical-just, 'Hm, this guy must like to read.' And, in fact, he didn't. It wasn't in his character at all. That's when I began to realize that the set has to match what's happening with the character," Bumstead explained.

According to some accounts, Hitchcock had photos taken of several bachelors' apartments as research material. No such photos survive today (in fact, the only research photos that still exist were taken at San Juan Bautista and the rejected Muir Woods site), and, according to Bumstead, he really didn't check a lot of apartments. He does recall, though, talking to the Asian gentleman who lived in the apartment at 900 Lombard in an effort to convince him to change the ironwork that can be seen outside the door (although Bumstead could not remember why they wanted to change the ironwork).


But there were a few specific requests from Hitchcock. According to Bumstead, he asked that Coit Tower appear outside Scottie's large apartment window, despite the fact that the actual tower was down the street (it can be seen in the background as Scottie and Madeleine talk on his porch), and the window in question appears to face the wrong direction. Hitchcock confessed to Bumstead his purposes: "I was in Hitch's office and he asked if I knew why he wanted Coit Tower outside the apartment window. I confessed that I didn't. He smiled and said, 'Coit Tower is a phallic symbol.'"

Filming for the apartment scene began at 9:45 with the long pan, which was accomplished in four takes: one with a bra hanging on the line in the kitchen, followed by three more without a bra, to satisfy the censor. One of the braless takes was chosen for the final cut.

A later shot was more difficult. It was a short moment-the phone rings and Madeleine wakes as Scottie answers it-but it was originally envisioned as an elaborate crane shot. Nine takes were required; it was difficult to get the timing right on the crane, the phone, and Madeleine. Two of the takes were printed, but ultimately the shot was discarded in favor of a simpler version. Similarly, the follow pan as Madeleine walks from the bedroom to the fireplace took six takes, with only the final two printed. Hitchcock spent time on this shot, eager that it should match in style the later shot of the remade Madeleine emerging from the Empire Hotel bathroom.

For Kim Novak, on her first day of studio work for the production, it wasn't an easy beginning. Not only did the apartment scene call for her first prolonged passages of dialogue; she had to begin the sequence lying naked in bed, and then finish it in only a robe. And, if Novak's own account is to be believed, the day began with one of the most famously harrowing on-set experiences in Hitchcock lore. When she reported to her dressing room in the morning of the first day, she has said, there was a plucked chicken hanging from her mirror; when she turned around, she found Hitchcock, Stewart, and the crew gathered at her door to see her reaction. Herbert Coleman could not confirm the story, but he wasn't inclined to deny anyone the right to add a little color to their memory of making the film.

Otherwise, her account of the shoot seems almost willfully charitable. "A lot of people said Hitchcock was difficult to work with," Novak has said, recalling those first few weeks. "But, partly because I knew nothing about technique, I loved working with him. You know, Harry Cohn didn't like the Vertigo script, but he said, 'It's Alfred Hitchcock-you'd better do it.' Hitchcock knew exactly what he wanted technically and helped me out with that, while allowing me to bring my own interpretation to the role."

There was an immediate closeness with Stewart. "Jimmy made me feel like I belonged. He had a wonderful way of making you feel that he'd never met anybody like you before. In the weeks ahead, he looked after me. He was like the boy next door, my father, and the brother I wished I had. He had a natural kindness and sensitivity. And that stutter. Perhaps I identified with it because I have always had a stutter of sorts, too. I was nervous at first with Hitchcock. I kept saying to Jimmy, 'What do you think he wants me to do?' Jimmy put a gentle arm on my shoulder and said, 'There, there now, Kim. It will be fine. Now, if Hitch didn't think that you were right for the part, he wouldn't have signed you to do it in the first place. You must believe in yourself.'''

After this first week of studio work, Novak would not return until October thirtieth, when part of the bell tower sequence was filmed. Barbara Bel Geddes was on the lot during this time, filming her first scene with Stewart Scene 16.

For all that's been written and rumored about Kim Novak's difficulty on the set, it's interesting to note that the greatest number of takes occurred on the Bel Geddes scenes. Yet Bel Geddes and Hitchcock got along extremely well.

She came prepared and had few pretenses; when she asked Hitchcock what he wanted, all he said was, "Don't act." "He and Edith Head gave me clothes that looked very well on me---little sweaters that 1 love, with little collars and little simple skirts, and 1 felt very secure. It was just the way 1 felt Midge should look."

The first day with Bel Geddes was long, beginning at 9:00 A.M. and ending close to 6:00 P.M. To bring the scene from Scottie's "ouch" as he reaches for the falling cane to the line "I had to quit" took eight long takes, with only the last printed. This was trumped by the eleven takes required for a later moment in the scene, again with only one take printed.
Bel Geddes returned after the weekend to continue the scene, this time averaging fewer takes; maybe she had taken Hitchcock's advice and stopped acting.

After the weekend, Henry Jones spent two problem-free days as the coroner in the inquest scene, which had caused so much trouble for the censors. No shot took more than four takes. For the inquest set-an exact replica of a room at the Bautista mission-Hitchcock made another special request: He asked Bumstead to secure the ceiling to the walls on the set. The customary film set had removable ceilings ("wild," in stage terms), which gave the crew greater flexibility in positioning cameras and lights; when Bumstead asked about the change, Hitch explained that he didn't want Burks lighting it like a studio, but like a location. This put Bumstead in a bind-he was good friends with Burks, for whom the fixed ceiling would make life more difficult-but this was Hitchcock.

Bumstead still remembers the look on Burks's face when they visited the set the day before shooting, but in retrospect, he concedes that Hitchcock was right: In the film, it is difficult to tell that the inquest scene wasn't shot on location. And further to the air of authenticity the ceiling gave the room, Hitchcock must have known that he would need a visible ceiling to pull off the extreme camera angle he wanted to use to open this scene of judgment-and that a sense of enclosure could only add to our feeling for Scottie, as Madeleine's death itself hangs over his head.

The first of the bell tower scenes filmed was the murder sequence from Judy's flashback, in which Elster throws his wife from the tower as Judy runs up and screams. The real Madeleine was played by Jean Corbett, who was made up with blood on her face for one of the takes. Seven takes were made, with all but the first printed, increasing Hitch's flexibility in the editing room-and suggesting a telling moment of indecision on the director's part about this crucial scene. The flashback scene (227)-Samuel Taylor's reluctant contribution, in which the story's secret is given away to the audience, had made it to the final drafts of the screenplay intact; this was the first sign of concern about it from Hitchcock during the production.

When the troublesome bell tower footage was safely in the can, the crew moved to Stage 16 to shoot Scottie and Madeleine's morning-after meeting outside Scottie's apartment. As with the Big Basin sequence, this was a matter of weaving together earlier establishing shots taken outside the actual apartment at 900 Lombard with new footage-it being easier to control the studio environment for shots involving serious dialogue or close-ups. The censors objected to one of the script's sly jokes---the intimation that Scottie enjoyed undressing Madeleine, not just meeting her-but Hitch got the shots he wanted, in a series of four or five takes. Then it was off to Ernie's---in a manner of speaking. Doc Erickson recalled that it was on impulse that Hitchcock decided to build the famous San Francisco restaurant Ernie's on the soundstage. After dining in a number of restaurants in San Francisco while scouting locations, the director announced at the end of a meal that they would build their own Ernie's at Paramount. Even the exteriors of Ernie's were filmed in the studio, Bumstead remembers.

According to Peggy Robertson, owner Rolando Gotti and maitre d' Carlo Dotto made quite a fortune off the traffic from people who associated Vertigo with Ernie's Restaurant. Ernie's is now gone, but as anyone who visited the San Francisco landmark before its demise would confirm, Henry Bumstead captured its essence on Stage 5 at Paramount.

The duplication is astonishing, a testament to Bumstead's ability to replicate a location on demand. Of course, the pressure was on: Not only was the forty-by-sixty-foot set designed to Hitchcock's high standard (and he never missed a detail: Robertson recalled that during the Fairmont ballroom scene, the director glanced at an ashtray and said, "Oh, this won't do. We must have ashtrays from the hotel"), but Bumstead also had the owners of Ernie's to impress: To add that last gesture of realism, they were brought in to appear in the scene, as well. (They can be seen briefly in both the Madeleine and Judy scenes as the maitre d' and bartender.)

The first day on the Ernie's set was October thirty-first. A great portion of the day's time was spent on setting up, rehearsing, and filming the challenging crane shot from the film's first Ernie's scene. The shot required eight takes, and nearly three hours to prepare and shoot. Later in the afternoon, it took far less time to film the close-up of Kim Novak and Stewart's point of view-six takes, printing the second and the last two-although this shot would be weighed in the balance, much later on, and found wanting.

The set was authentic down to the food, which was prepared by Ernie's itself. The menu that was set before the extras consisted of salad with Roquefort dressing, New York steaks, baked potatoes, vegetables, banana fritters, and zabaglione. Neil Rau's account of the filming in the Los Angeles Examiner gives a sense of what the mock "evening at Ernie's" was like:

A half hour later, after Hitchcock has indulged his craving for realism by trying take after take, it is beginning to be noticeable that the extras have had their fill. They're having to act, now, to make it appear they are enjoying their food.
Hitchcock either has sensed this or he has obtained what he considered just the exact footage he needs. He looks at his wrist watch and beckons me over to the camera.
"Watch what happens now," he whispers. And there is an audible groan from the roomful of extras when Hitchcock, his eyes twinkling, calls out in a serious voice:
"That was a good morning's work, folks. Now you can have an hour for lunch!"

Cast and crew returned to the Paramount soundstage on November first to film the Judy scenes in Ernie's. They had few difficulties, and when they were finished, they spent the remainder of the day on a number of retakes for scenes they had already worked on: Elster's club, the notorious Scene 151 (Scottie's apartment), and the brief scene outside the apartment.

The next day, it was back to Scottie's apartment for another difficult passage: Scene 189, in which Madeleine returns to Scottie's apartment early in the morning, tormented by the dream of the church in San Juan Bautista. The going was not easy: Seven takes were required on the first setup and eleven on the next, which began with Scottie's line "It was a dream, you're awake, you're all right now." This scene, which lasts about two minutes, took twenty-five minutes to film.

But now there was evidence of trouble: They returned the next day to try again on Scene 151. But even on this round, Hitchcock remained unsatisfied. Looking at the rushes the next evening, he resolved to return to Scene 151 yet again, despite the delay and expense.

The bad luck continued. After shooting a brief scene on the Fairmont ballroom set, the crew returned to the set for Midge's apartment to shoot the quick scene just before she and Scottie leave for the Argosy Book Shop. The camera setup was a simple track forward and pan as Scottie begins to fix a drink, Midge charges out the door to Pop Liebel's-but nothing seemed to work. Eleven takes clicked by and not a single take was printed.

They returned to continue the battle, retaking not only this scene but also the first scene with Midge. Then they moved on to the portrait scene in Midge's apartment, but after numerous takes, once again nothing was printed. The frustration level must have been high, with the pressure weighing especially hard on Bel Geddes, whose scenes seemed to be the hardest to get right.

Once more into the breach the next day: Stewart did seven takes on the line "It's not funny, Midge" (the last printed), Bel Geddes six of "Stupid, stupid, stupid." With so many takes, are we to draw the conclusion that there was a problem with Bel Geddes? There's no strong evidence either way and the scenes offer unique challenges for the actors and the director. Peggy Robertson remembers Hitchcock liking the actress, but she does recall them having to do the scene over and over again. We do know that Hitchcock liked her enough to cast her again several months later for his television series, in the episode "Lamb to the Slaughter."

What is clear is that both performers were having bad days with difficult scenes. The proof is in the film. Only a cynic could walk away from a screening without a great deal of sympathy for Midge as Bel Geddes portrays her.

The next couple of days were spent on the effects stage, with Farciot Edouart and Wallace Kelley shooting the Argosy Book Shop scene and the car interiors with Midge. It's no secret that Hitchcock used transparency (or rear screen projection) work for such scenes. The director described rear-projection in his interview with Peter Bogdanovich:

For rear-projection shooting there is a screen and behind it is an enormous projector throwing an image on the screen. On the studio floor is a narrow white line right in line with the projector lens and the lens of the camera must be right on that white line. The camera is not photographing the screen, and what's on it; it is photographing light in certain colors; therefore the camera lens must be level and in line with the projector lens.

Though somehow car work is always obvious, the projection shots in Vertigo are of the highest quality-and a slight difference in quality can make all the difference in preserving the audience's suspension of disbelief (as some of Hitchcock's more awkward efforts of the 1960s would prove). To incorporate rear-screen footage successfully into a shot, the director of photography and the effects specialist must work together to match the lighting of what was shot by the second unit and what's being shot by the director on the effects stage. There is no better work in any film than what Burks and Edouart achieved in the Argosy Book Shop scene.

One of the persistent questions about the film has to do with this scene, in which the interior and exterior of the shop darken as Pop Liebel tells his story. It was a technical challenge for Hitchcock and crew to get the studio set to darken in perfect timing with the complicated transparency work. The gradual darkening is at first imperceptible. Within moments, though, the ambient lighting has dimmed severely enough that the actors are no longer clearly visible. Nice film work, but the real magic occurs when Scottie and Midge step outside: The effects specialists exceeded themselves, projecting the transparency footage so that it was reflected behind the actors on the exterior glass of the Argosy Book Shop; in the background, Pop Liebel turns on the interior lights. It's impossible to tell that the scene wasn't shot on location.

Robert Burks was a specialist at this kind of work, according to Bumstead. Burks and Leonard South had begun their careers together in the Warner Bros. special effects department, and their expertise in using lighting renders all these tricks invisible.
Hitchcock's preoccupation with the red, gold, and green color palette while making Vertigo made for a number of memorable scenes, but not every attempt was successful. During the simple process shots in the Scottie-Midge car scene that immediately follows the Argosy sequence, Hitchcock experimented with a green filter on the projector used for the transparency. They shot twenty minutes of film-ten takes, in the last three of which, the green filter was used. The choice of the filter was later abandoned for that shot, but Hitchcock tried it again on the following over-the-shoulder shot when Scottie, sitting alone, looks at Portrait of Carlotta in the museum catalog. The first take was shot with the green filter, the second without-and it is the second that was circled as Hitchcock's choice.
Later that afternoon, using a stand-in for Kim Novak, the crew shot test footage of the green-light effect in Judy's bedroom-the effect inspired by the original Empire Hotel's neon sign. They did nine takes, with the light varied slightly each time to create the striking green silhouette effects that became a highlight of the Judy-Scottie scenes.

After the effects work, the production moved to what was expected to be Bel Geddes's last day of work: the brief, poignant scene in the sanitarium. The exteriors had been filmed in February and March 1957 at St. Joseph's Hospital at Park Hill (which are now luxury apartments). The day did not start well. The actor cast as the doctor was unprepared.
The first shot in the doctor's office was set up at 9:59 A.M., but by 10:15 Hitchcock had shut down work and called for a replacement.
 
"Hitchcock would do this sometimes, which could be very embarrassing.
But he knew what he wanted. I remember that we filmed quite a bit with a major character in Family Plot when Hitch decided he wasn't working-so we had to go back and do it all over again," Bumstead recalls.

While they waited for a new doctor, the crew moved to Midge's apartment on Stage 11 and retook part of Scene 136, the "Stupid, stupid, stupid" scene. They shot a new close-up of Midge saying "What have you been doing?" while waiting for Jimmy Stewart to come in to shoot a scene that wouldn't make it to the finished film: the brief, wordless tag ending that found Scottie returned to Midge's company at the conclusion. The setup for this shot was extensive-the crew began close to noon and finished a little after three. Robertson describes the scene in her notes:

Sc: 276. Int: Midge's Apartment. 50mm [lens size]. Variable diffusion [referring to filters used in takes]. Midge listening to giant radio [recording] CRANE FORWARD & JIB DOWN as Scottie enters & goes to window. She gives him drink and sits. Tag end.

The shot required nine takes; Hitchcock printed the fifth and ninth, and they were off again by 4:00 P.M., moving back to Stage 6 to shoot the doctor's scene. Raymond Bailey (who'd later become well known as the banker on TV's The Beverly Hillbillies) was an improvement over the previous actor, though the short scene that marked Midge's farewell seemed doomed to lifelessness. The first shot was recorded at 5:25, the last shot at 6:15.

Weekend screenings revealed problems with some of the exterior Argosy Book Shop scenes, so Bel Geddes returned for an additional morning's work on Monday; by lunch, the actress was finished and free to return to New York.

The entire afternoon was spent on the kiss in the livery stable Scene 199. There were five basic setups required for this scene, ranging from standard two-shots to big-head close-ups of the kiss. Six takes were made of the big-head close-up-one set favoring Madeleine, another three takes favoring Scottie.

Back in the corporate offices, meanwhile, the battle over the title was coming to a head. On October twenty-second, Hitchcock and Coleman had been cabled from the New York office: "No execs like vertigo and believe it handicap to selling and advertising picture whether potential customers know what word Vertigo means or not-believe decidedly better title would be "Face in the Shadow." Hitchcock remained adamant: Vertigo was his preferred title. (It's hard to blame him; among all the memorable images in the film, faces hidden in shadow weren't exactly paramount.) Another cable was sent on October twenty-fourth:

"I understand that you are still seriously interested in the title vertigo for your current production and that you have also indicated that you are thinking of other possible titles. We are checking for you the title Fear and Trembling. Please reconsider list." The cable was signed by Paramount's Sam Frey, who included a new, longer list of possibilities:

Afraid to Love
Alone in the Dark
The Apparition
Behind the Mask
Carlotta
Checkmate
Conscience
Cry from the Rooftop
The Dark Tower
Deceit
Deceitful
Deception
Don't Leave Me
Dream Without Ending
The Face
Variations
Footsteps
For the Last Time
The Hidden Life
In the Shadows
The Investigator
A Life Is Forever
The Lure
Malice
The Mask and the Face
The Mask Illusion
My Madeleine
Never Leave Me
Night Shade
Nothing Is Forever
Now and Forever
Past, Present and Future
The Phantom
The Second Chance
The Shadow
Shadow and Substance
Shadow on the Stairs Shock
Steps on the Stairs Terror
To Live Again
Tonight Is Ours
Too Late My Love
Two Kinds of Women

The Unknown

Wanted

Without a Trace

The Witness

Hitchcock had no intention of changing his title, and the list was ignored.

By the end of the month, there were signs of fatigue on the executives' part:
"Have serious doubts-but will go along if insist-just make your name same size as title." The same day, the lawyers began a title search to make sure Vertigo was clear. The title was declared available on November seventh, Production 10344 became Vertigo on the nineteenth on all internal paperwork, and Sam Frey made it official to the world two days later.

The first day under the official title was spent back on the effects stage; cast and crew shot more livery-stable footage, the dialogue at the mission's cloisters that precedes Madeleine's suicide (murder) and the shots inside her Jaguar as she and Scottie drive to San Juan Bautista. The work proceeded with few problems---the highest take count was five.
The next few days, on the Ransohoffs department store set, were a different story. The work was slow, some setups requiring seven or nine takes. One complicated setup began with a close-up of Scottie.

Big Head Scottie seated from (off screen) "I think I know the suit you mean" down to (off screen) "I won't do it." CRANE ROUND & FORWARD as Scottie rises and joins Judy at mirror for dialogue: from "It can't make that much difference" to "You've got to do this." Reflections in mirror-backs to camera.

This is the shot that is in the film, but what looks relatively simple on screen was indeed complicated to mount. Most of the takes were spoiled by crane problems or focus problems. One take was blown because one of the crew's makeup kits could be seen in a mirror. Only the first and last takes (one and nine) were printed.

The day ended in Judy's room at the Empire---a simple shot over Judy's shoulder as she opens the door and sees Scottie for the first time, accomplished in a single setup and single take. The next few days would focus on the scenes in Judy's room, Friday and Monday on this first scene (227) between Judy and Scottie.

The most interesting work came during the scene that would cause so many problems after the film was completed: the moment when Judy writes the letter to Scottie, then tears it up as she decides to pursue him instead. This was a bravura performance for all involved, from the actress herself to the camera and lighting crews who captured it. Two distinct choices were filmed. The first began with a close-up of Judy's left hand as she begins to write, then craned back and around. The camera then panned up to a close-up on her face and tracked back as she rises, following her as she crosses to the closet.

The second version began with a close-up of her face, not her hand, and then followed the action of the previous take. Each option took four takes, but the entire setup, with its elaborate crane movements, required more than two hours. Only one take was printed on the second option, but this was what Hitchcock chose for the film-though he did insert a moment of Judy's hand as she writes before beginning the crane shot around the desk.
The production team had accomplished all of the first scenes in Judy's hotel room---as well as the brief scene in Scottie's apartment where he convinces her to change her hair---by the end of November. Beyond dozens of brief connection shots, there remained the scene that included Judy's reemergence as Madeleine (the green-fog shot for which the crew had been preparing) and the 360-degree kiss (known to the crew as "the roundy-roundy shot." All of their work that Friday, November 29, was devoted to the sequence that includes her entrance: The morning was spent on the shots of Scottie waiting, then watching as Judy approaches, her hair now the right color but not yet the right style.

After a lunch break, the crew took care of the business that gets Judy into the bathroom to fix her hair, in six takes---one lost to a line fluff---take four (the director's favorite, Robertson noted dutifully) and six were printed.

The next moment---the instant of Judy's transformation into Madeleine's image, and Scottie's vision---is one of the film's most stunning. Yet a careful reading of the shooting script reveals a major difference from the finished film. Here are the script's instructions for the scene:

246. SCOTTIE Judy-please-
(Judy doesn't answer for a moment, then she draws a deep breath, and turns resignedly away. She crosses to the mirror over a chest of drawers. Scottie watches as she picks up a couple of pins from a glass tray, and scoops up a handful of hair.)
(Scottie stands watching in silence. His eyes follow every move. We hear the tinkle of pins on the glass tray.)
247. FROM SCOTTIE'S VIEWPOINT
(Judy slowly turns from the mirror to face him. She looks exactly like Madeleine-her hair pulled back and done in a bun at the back of her neck. She stands there looking at him.)
(Scottie looks at her in wonder, his eyes shining.)
(Judy takes a step towards him, rewarded by his expression.) (Scottie moves over and takes Judy in his arms.)
In the original, then, the change took place in Scottie's presence, and ours:
"His eyes follow every move" as she pins her hair back, completing the illusion. For the final film, though, Hitchcock changed strategies, conceiving of the scene so that the final transformation happens off---screen---heightening the mystery of the change, and giving the director the opportunity to realize her reemergence in a single breathtaking shot. Here is the new version as described in Peggy Robertson's notes:
Sc: 247. Int: Judy's Bedroom. 50mm Shooting from the center. Scottie stands at window back to camera: turns. Turns back to window---hands on jamb. Hears door click and turns back. TRACK FORWARD to CU as he recognizes her.

The longing and expectation on Stewart's face are painfully visible and real. The moment was accomplished in a single take. A second setup was done with just a close-up in the same moment-the second was necessary only because the first went too quickly. After filming Scottie, they got on film three takes of what they had longed to see-the emerging Madeleine "bathed in green." All three takes-two with the full green effect, one with less green as an alternate-were printed. (Later, in December, they would return to try the shot with the green haze again.) With remarkable ease, some of cinema's finest moments were accomplished that late afternoon, and filming concluded for the day.

Novak remembers that important day's work: "It was so real to me, the coming out and wanting approval in that scene. It was like, is this what you want? Is this what you want from me? My whole body was trembling. I mean I had chills inside and goose bumps all over just because it was the ultimate defining moment of anybody when they're going to someone they love and they just want to be perfect for them. And that's what I think makes it contemporary. It's about that thing that goes wrong in love, when you're attracted to someone and then suddenly you need to change them."

The next two days, alas, took the crew back in time as they endeavored to reshoot the dreaded Scene 151 of Madeleine and Scottie in his apartment after her suicide attempt. Nearly a week had already been spent on this sequence; by this point, the production was nineteen days behind schedule (only four of which were due to bad weather) and nearly a quarter of a million dollars over budget. Almost all of the delay can be ascribed to this one stubborn scene. But now, out of desperation or familiarity, or a little of both, they got it right. In two days, the scene was at long last finished. The production still faced the final tower sequence, the special-effects work for the vertigo shots, and all of the process work for the opening rooftop sequence.

Next on the agenda, though, was the ultimate kiss. Scottie and Judy (now become Madeleine)kiss in the room at the Empire Hotel. This kiss-the "roundy-roundy" shot-was one of the film's daring gestures, a bold way to suggest Scottie's psychological maelstrom without resorting to expositional dialogue. As the couple kiss, the camera begins revolving around them-and the background that surrounds them transforms as surely as Judy had, becoming for just a moment the livery stable where Scottie and Madeleine had shared their last moments together. Among film students, this is one of the film's most widely discussed shots, but differing accounts of how the trick was accomplished have led to widespread misunderstanding.

Over the years, some of the crew members have seemed to recall that a special circular set combining the hotel and livery scenes was built and filmed as a process-shot background-which has led some to believe that the entire shot was filmed on such a combination set. But Bumstead (who would have had to design any such thing) remembers that the entire scene was done using process footage put together from the two locations-the livery stable and the studios set for the Empire Hotel room.

"As I remember, it was all process. We had them on a turntable. The rest was on a transparency," Bumstead recalls. "The turntable can make you dizzy, though." The footage filmed in San Juan Bautista faded into a slow pan of Judy's hotel room to make the final process shot that was projected behind Stewart and Novak; the background resolved into a solid neon green as the shot ended. The impression thus created was that the camera was moving full circle around the lovers, when in reality it was the rear-projection image and the actors who were turning. The camera's movement is limited to a gentle track backward, then forward once again.

Hitchcock explained that he had wanted to prove that "if a man remembers something, he experiences that memory, he doesn't look at it, as we have seen in so many films, under the guise of traditional flashbacks.

"I wanted a man with a woman in his arms experiencing a sensation identical to that of the original moment. To do that I built a set of a hotel room and also of a stable, then I put them side by side on the same stage and made the backdrop we see on the screen, with hotel room and stable linked together. Then I placed the actors on a small turntable and coordinated the two rotating movements." (From an interview conducted by Rui Nogueira and Nicoletta Zalaffi in 1972)

The tricky portion for Novak and Stewart was the final moment of the shot, where they were supposed to slide down and out of the shot. Since the camera was not actually circling, the actors were forced to lean farther and farther forward during this embrace, making it appear that they are going to lie down together. (This implication had been present since the very first story outlines, when Coppel had merely written "He lays her.")

This sort of uncomfortable movement during a kiss was a popular technique for Hitchcock. He had used a similar awkward movement with Cary Grant and Ingrid Bergman in Notorious, and he did again in his next film, North by Northwest, with Grant and Eva Marie Saint.

The kiss was filmed on December sixteenth, three days before the picture wrapped. On the first take, Hitchcock called "Cut" in the first moments: The timing of the turntable was off, throwing their positioning out of whack. The second take went quite well until the final moment: As Stewart leaned into Novak, he slipped and fell, hurting himself seriously enough to require an hour's break while Stewart visited the studio doctor.
But there was no serious damage, and Stewart returned to shoot three more takes. The fourth and fifth were printed, and it is the fifth take that appears in the film; but the couple never quite got that final descent right, and in the end, the scene fades out with their two faces still filling the scene.

The day took an emotional toll on the actors. "Jimmy was deeply involved-more than anything else I've known he's done," Novak remembered.

"He'd go deep inside himself to prepare for an emotional scene. He was not the kind of actor who, when the director said, 'Cut!' would be able to say, 'OK,' and walk away. I was the same way. He'd squeeze my hand and we'd allow each other to come down slowly, like in a parachute. He had this sensitivity I'll never forget."

The final days on the Vertigo set were full of activity: retakes in Scottie's apartment; the Elizabeth Arden inserts (where Judy gets her hair dyed); the steps of the bell tower; more interior Jaguar work; and the infamous water-tank shoot-all were dispatched in record time.

Some of the legend surrounding Vertigo has it that Hitchcock shot take after grueling take of Kim Novak jumping into the Paramount tank, but this is a myth. A double did the jump into the real bay some months earlier; Novak was obliged only to float in the tank, waiting for Stewart to save her, for four takes (approximately forty minutes). The first take was ruined because Stewart's hair looked wrong; in the next, he paused too long on the dive; the third didn't match the previously shot footage of Scottie lifting her out. And in the fourth take, only camera A ran (there were two cameras covering this shot-one shooting from the top of the dock, looking at Madeleine floating in the water, while the second covered Scottie diving into the water). Between the two cameras, the four takes were sufficient to cut together the scene, and Novak returned safely to dry land.

The last days of principal photography focused on the film's opening, and the signature shot of every Hitchcock film-his brief cameo appearance.

Jimmy Stewart spent December eighteenth hanging around-quite literally, on Stage 6, as they filmed the rooftop chase that brought about Scottie's crippling vertigo. Most of the long-shot work was handled by a double, but Stewart himself appears in the shot where he slips and must grab onto the edge. All of the shots took only one take (except for the first angle on the fall, which required two because Stewart's face was hidden in the first).

The latter part of the afternoon was spent sitting in Scottie's DeSoto doing process work for some of the “following” scenes.  This different work from slipping and hanging on to a ledge.  All that was required of Stewart was to set in a parked car with a projection screen behind and steer the car in accordance with the direction indicated by the footage.  Shooting two of these sequences took only about twenty minutes of Stewart’s time; after he went home, Hitch and crew returned to the rooftop set to film the cop's dialogue and fall, using a double for Scottie's hands.

Thursday, December nineteenth, was the last day of principal photography on Vertigo, but it was hardly a slow finish. This is the list of setups for the last day:

Elizabeth Arden Judy's Apt.
McKittrick Hotel, front door Tank
Dark Passage Rooftops
Ext. Shipyard Ext. Ernie's Int. Tank Closet
Ext. Dolores Mission (process)
Some of this footage was shot by a second-unit team, under the direction of Herbert Coleman and Danny McCauley. Most of the shots involved were brief, but they included an important shot, "Judy's Apt." (her hotel room), a retake of Scottie waiting for Judy to emerge from the bathroom with her new Madeleine look complete. It is this version (again done in only one take) that is in the final film:

Sc: 247. Int.: Judy's Bedroom. 75mm Variable RETAKE PF 491 Scottie in front of green window. Facing cam. Turns & sits on arm of chair. Looks around. Rise. TRACK FORWARD as he stands looking camera left.

Around lunchtime on the nineteenth, this important moment was filmed near the paint shop on the Paramount lot:

Sc. 21. Ext.: Shipyard. Mr. Hitchcock walks camera left to right & out passing Scottie entering. Scottie pauses to speak to Gateman who gestures & Scottie walks on & out.

It was the end of principal photography but not the end of work for most of the crew. Additional second-unit work was to be done during postproduction, some of which would require further work from Stewart---including the all---important "vertigo shots" and the dream sequence.

But now, it was time for Christmas vacation. Within forty-eight hours of the production's last shot, the Hitchcock’s and the Wassermann’s were on their way to a month's vacation in Jamaica.